Message edged pad

ABSTRACT

A pad of paper bound at one edge for facile removal of one or more sheets of paper, including an indicium display area with indicium included therein, such area being defined by the collective unbound edges of a side or end of such pad whereby said indicium remains visible when viewed either from the top or indicium display area edge of such pad notwithstanding the removal of some or all but one of the sheets of paper in such pad. The method of manufacturing such paper pad including the steps of stacking a plurality of paper sheets for cutting, each of such sheets bearing an identical indicium identically placed thereon; cutting such sheets to render such message visible from the top and end of such stack; and, re-stacking such sheets for binding into a pad at an edge thereof removed from such indicium.

United States Patent [1 1 North Hollywood, Calif. 91605 [22] Filed: July 10, 1972 [21] Appl. No.: 270,099

[52] US. Cl. 283/63 R, 283/36 [51] Int. Cl. 342d 15/00 [58] Field of Search 283/63, 56, 36-43, 283/34, 35; 281/15 R [56] References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 1,061,790 5/1913 Webb; 283/63 A 1,885,928 11/1932 Lilly 283/63 A 1,932,153 10/1933 Bergendahl 281/15 R 2,369,173 2/1945 Oppenheimer 283/42 Primary ExaminerLawrence Charles Raymer June 18, 1974 MESSAGE EDGED PAD [76] Inventor: Paul Raymer, 13012 Vanowen St., [57] ABSTRACT A pad of paper bound at one edge for facile removal of one or more sheets of paper, including an indicium display area with indicium included therein, such area being defined by the collective unbound edges of a side or end of such pad whereby said indicium remains visible when viewed either from the top or indicium display area edge of such pad notwithstanding the removal of some or all but one of the sheets of paper in such pad. The method of manufacturing such paper pad including the steps of stacking a plurality of paper sheets for cutting, each of such sheets bearing an identical indicium identically placed thereon; cutting such sheets to render such message visible from the top and end of such stack; and, re-stacking such sheets for binding into a pad at an edge thereof removed from such indicium.

4 Claims, 9 Drawing Figures 1 MESSAGE EDGED PAD BACKGROUND or THE iNvaNrroN 1. Field of the Invention The present invention generally pertains to writing pads of a type bound along one or more edges for facile removal of one ormore sheets, such as scratch pads,

- form an integral pad from which one or more sheets may be easily torn and discarded to permit access to underlying sheets. Examples of such pads may be found in virtually every home, beside telephones for message noting, and in virtually every business office or work area where people are constantly making reminder notes, taking messages or posting memos. Often times these pads are imprinted with various messages, sayings or pictures. Many business entities and personalities supply such imprinted pads to customers or acquaintances with indicia such as name, address, telephone number, or logo imprinted thereon to serve as continuing reminders to the users of the pad of the person supplying them. All of such known pad configurations share common deficiencies however: eitherthe indicium are imprinted only on the face of each sheet and hence, is fully visible only from above; or, the indicium is imprinted only on the end surface collectively defined by the ends of the sheets in the pad and, hence, is only fullyv visible from such end and increasing portions of the message or logo disappear as sheets are removed from the padfTo provide a most novel writing pad, or the like, which incorporates structures for the display of an indicium fully visible notwithstanding the removal of sheets therefrom, and to thereby overcome the shortcomings of the prior art, the present invention pad has been invented.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention is best summarized as an article of manufacture comprising a plurality of sheets including a bottom sheet, arranged in stacked relationship to form a stack always having one uppermost sheet, each of said sheets having a first edge, a face and a reverse side; at least some portion of an indicium included on the face of each of said sheets to extend from such first edge over an area of such face adjacent to such first edge; the sheets being arranged in the stack so that successive sheets of the stack bear a generally lesser portion of the indicium relative to the sheets adjacent to the reverse side thereof, whereby the area of the face adjacent to the first edge of the uppermost sheet of such stack cooperates with the first edges of the remaining sheets of such stack to define an indicium display area within which the entirety of such indicium may be visually perceived thereon notwithstanding the removal of any number of sheets except the bottom sheet.

A significant advantage of the present invention is the extremely novel structure which increases the reminder or advertising value of such pad.

Further advantages of the present invention are the simplicity of structural achievement of the novel effect and the method of manufacture.

The present invention, together with yet further advantages thereof, will be better understood with reference to the following detailed descriptions and the accompanying drawings.

DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWING In the drawing: FIG. 1 is a perspective view of an illustrative embodiment of the present invention structure;

FIG. 2 is another perspective view of the FIG. 1 embodiment of the present invention structure displaying the novel and unique indicium display features, wherein a portion of the sheets of the embodiment have been removed from view;

FIG. 3 is a perspective view of another embodiment of the present invention;

FIGS. 40-8 are various plan and elevation views depicting sequential steps in the manufacutre of the present invention structure, each such step being more fully explained in the following Detailed Description; and

FIG. 9 is a top plan view of the structural result of one combination of the aforesaid manufacturing steps.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION The present invention essentially contemplates an article of manufacture comprising a plurality of sheets, one end of all of which collectively define an indicium display area for the display of various indicia originally affixed to each of such sheets proximate the end thereof where such display area is desired to be defined. While the present invention may take various structural shapes, depending upon the indicium display area configuration desired, all such shapes nevertheless possess common structural and indicium placement characteristics which combine to render such indicium viewable from the end and above such article irrespective of the number of sheets in such article.

While it will become apparent that the present invention equally embraces any article which may be formed by combining discrete sheets of any material of substantially uniform dimension, for ease of reference, the following description of the present invention is given with respect to but one commonly utilitarian application of the present invention a pad of paper such as a memo pad, comprising a plurality of sheets which cooperatively define an imprinted indicium display area.

Referring to FIGS. l-3, there are shown various examples of structural embodiments embraced by the present invention, each of which possess distinct indicium display area configurations, and all of which configurations possess the same indicium display area viewability characteristics, i.e., the chosen indicium is viewable from either top or end position (e.g., see arrows A and B respectively of FIG. 2), independent of the number of sheets removed from the pad. All of such configurations enjoy a common element; a bottom most sheet upon or to the face of which is affixed the entire indicium to be displayed.

Against the foregoing background, referring to FIG. 1, there is shown a pad 10 which is comprised of a plurality of stacked paper sheets 12, each of which sheets has a face 12a and a reverse side 12b. For simplicity in the illustrated embodiments of the present invention, the sheets 12 are stacked in reverse side-to-face relationship, although it will be understood from the following that such arrangement is not necessary to the present invention. For example, the sheets 12 could be stacked with other intermediate objects such as one or more pieces of carbon paper or other tear-out material.

In the illustrated embodiments of the present invention, the pad is depicted as a completed memorandum pad to include the lower-most backing support member, 14, commonly known as chip board rigid material, and the padding compound 16, an application of known conventional materials used to fasten edges of paper together to permit easy removal. In the illustrative embodiments of FIGS. 1 and 2, the sheets 12 are of essentially uniformly graduated lengths, L, with the bottom sheet being the longest, and all are of substantially the same width, W. In the illustrative embodiment of FIG. 3, all of the sheets 12 are of substantially the same length, L, and of the same width, W. For purposes of the present invention, the sheets 12 need not all be of the same width, W, and, in fact, could vary in width in the same manner as they do in length, L.

As will be shown with greater clarity hereinafter, the proximate relationship of the sheets 12 create an indicium display area partially defined by the unbound edges of the sheet 12. This indicium display area may be defined either at an end of the pad opposite the padding compound 16 or at the sides 18 of the pad, depending upon the manufacturing method chosen. In like manner, such indicium display area as is defined by the unbound edges of the sheets 12 may either be essentially planar as illustrated, or could be non-planar, again depending only upon the method of manufacture chosen. For ease of discussion only, the remainder of the description will be limited to constructions which are substantially planar and are located at an end 20 of the pad opposite the padding compound 16.

The indicium display area 22 is structurally defined by the area collectively defined by the edges of the sheets 12 and adjacent portions of the top-most sheet faces 12a. The ultimate limits of the indicium display area are determined by the structural definition of such area and the particular type of indicium chosen. Three illustrative variations of these principles of the present invention are shown in FIGS. l-3. In FIG. 1, the entire indicium, viewable from both A and B, is fully displayed in the area 22 collectively defined by edges of the sheets 12. In FIG. 2, the entire indicium, also viewable from both A and B, is fully displayed, notwithstanding the removal of one or more sheets 12, in the area 22 collectively defined by the edges of the sheets 12 and adjacent portions thereof. In FIG. 3, the entire indicium, viewable from A and B, is fully displayed, with or without the removal of any of the sheets 12, in the area 22 collectively defined by the edges of the sheets 12 and adjacent portions thereof.

With reference to FIGS. 4a-9, there are shown illustrative steps in the manufacture of the present invention article.

Illustrative of the first step in the present invention method of manufacture, referring first to FIGS. 4a and 4b,.a plurality of sheets of paper 24 have had affixed thereto, by printing or other appropriate method known in the art, an indicium 26, such indicium being affixed proximate an edge thereof, in the illustrative case, the end edge 28. It will be observed that the indicium could be affixed proximate any edge of the sheet 24, but, for ease of description, the end edge 28 has been selected as the indicium proxirnation edge. The indicium afiixed sheets 24 are placed in a stack 30 in relatively vertical edge alignment, as shown in FIG. 4b, in face-to-reverse side relationship so that the indicium 26 is viewable from above as illustrated in the top plan view of FIG. 4a.

Referring now to FIGS. 5a and 5b, the stack 30 is then offset, or angularly displaced, from its essentially vertical edge-alignment by the displacement angle a, such angle a being measured from the relatively vertical planar edge area 32 to the angularly displaced planar edge area 34. The magnitude of a is purely a matter of choice but may serve as a convenient reference for repeated manufacture of similar sized sheets and indicia. For example, a larger displacement will produce the indicia display configuration of FIGS. 1 and 9, while a smaller or no displacement may be used to produce the indicia display configurations of FIGS. 2 and 3. The displacement may be determined by hand, automatic means or by use of the illustrated angular cutting jig 36, preselected for the desired displacement angle a, which is pushed against the edge of the stack 30 opposite the indicia edge 28 to displace the stack 30 by the angular amount or toward the indicia edge 28. The top plan view of FIG. 5b illustrates the result of the displacement step of FIG. 5a for one form of indicia placement.

Referring now to FIGS. 6a and 6b, the next step in the manufacture of the present invention, the cutting step, is illustrated. The stack 30 is placed beneath a cutting implement 38 and cut so that the displaced portions 40 of the sheets are removed from the stack. It will be noted that such cutting causes successively smaller portions of the sheets 12 to be removed from successively lower sheets in the stack. This cutting implement may be either linear, so as to give a substantially planar effect to the cut-edge of the stack, or may be non-linear so as to impart a non-planar effect. It is preferable that the cutting step be followed such that no substantial portion of the bottom sheet of the stack is removed. On completion of this step, all or a portion of the chosen indicia will now be visible across the cut end of the stack as shown in FIG. 7, an end view taken along the line 7-7 of FIG. 6b.

Referring now to FIGS. 8 and 9, using, for example, the same cutting jig 36, the stack 30 is now jogged or displaced back a like amount to its original position to define the relatively vertical area 32, and the padding compound 16 and bottom support 14 are added to thereby complete the pad-with-indicium configuration illustrated in FIGS. 1 or 2 and 9. The pad configuration of FIG. 3 could be completed in the same manner with the addition of a second cutting step to remove the displaced sheet portion 42, as illustrated in FIG. 6b, and eliminating the straightening step illustrated in FIG.

There has thus been described a new and novel form of paper pad and methodof manufacturing the same, displaying unique structural indicium display characteristics. Although the present invention has been described with a certain degree of particularity, it is understood that the disclosure has been made only by way of example and that numerous changes in the details of construction may be resorted to without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention as hereinafter claimed.

What is claimed is:

1. An article of manufacture comprising:

a. a plurality of sheets including a bottom sheet, arranged in stacked relationship to form a stack always having one uppermost sheet, each of said sheets having a first edge, a face and a reverse side;

edges of the remaining sheets of said stack to define an indicium display area within which the entirety of said indicium may be visually perceived thereon notwithstanding the removal of any number of said sheets except said bottom sheet.

2. An article of manufacture as defined in claim 1 wherein each of said sheets includes a second edge opposite said first edge and wherein the dimension of each of such sheets as measured between said first edge and said second edge is greater for successive sheets below said uppermost sheet.

3. An article of manufacture as defined in claim 1 wherein said first edge is non-linear.

4. An article of manufacture as defined in claim 1 and further including a layer of padding compound applied over the area defined by the collective edges, other than said first edge of said stacked sheets,

whereby a pad is formed.

' UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE CERTIFICATE OF CORRECTION Patent No. 3,817,492 Dated June 18. 1974 Paul Raymer Inventor(s) It is certified that error appears in the above-identified patent and that said Letters Patent are hereby corrected as shown below:

Column 1 line 32 before "imprinted" delete "are" and insert is Column 3 line 28 after "the", "sheet" should read 0 sheets Signed and sealed this 1st day of October 1974.

(SEAL) Attest:

MCCOY M. GIBSON JR. C. VARSHALL DANN Commissioner of Patents Attesting Officer USCOMM-DC 50375-P69 U 5 GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE: 869- 930 

1. An article of manufacture comprising: a. a plurality of sheets including a bottom sheet, arranged in stacked relationship to form a stack always having one uppermost sheet, each of said sheets having a first edge, a face and a reverse side; b. at least some portion of an indicium included on the face of each of said sheets to extend from said first edge over an area of said face adjacent to said first edge; c. said sheets being arranged in said stack so that successive sheets of said stack bear a generally lesser portion of said indicium relative to the sheets adjacent to the reverse side thereof, whereby said area of said face adjacent to said first edge of the uppermost sheet of said stack cooperates with said first edges of the remaining sheets of said stack to define an indicium display area within which the entirety of said indicium may be visually perceived thereon notwithstanding the removal of any number of said sheets except said bottom sheet.
 2. An article of manufacture as defined in claim 1 wherein each of said sheets includes a second edge opposite said first edge and wherein the dimension of each of such sheets as measured between said first edge and said second edge is greater for successive sheets below said uppermost sheet.
 3. An article of manufacture as defined in claim 1 wherein said first edge is non-linear.
 4. An article of manufacture as defined in claim 1 and further including a layer of padding compound applied over the area defined by the collective edges, other than said first edge of said stacked sheets, whereby a pad is formed. 